Highlights of This Issue
According to incomplete statistics from PANews, there were 9 investment and financing events in the global blockchain sector last week (1.5-1.11), with a total funding scale exceeding $298 million. The overview is as follows:
- DeFi announced 2 investment and financing events. Among them, the RWA project TBook announced it has cumulatively raised over $10 million, with the new round led by SevenX Ventures;
- The Web3+AI track announced 1 investment and financing event. NeuroMesh completed a $5 million strategic round with participation from Alpha Capital and others;
- The Infrastructure & Tools field announced 3 investment and financing events. Among them, the decentralized protocol Babylon completed a $15 million financing round led by a16z Crypto;
- The Centralized Finance field announced 2 investment and financing events. Among them, stablecoin payment company Rain announced the completion of a new $250 million financing round;
- Other Web3 Applications announced 1 investment and financing event. The Web3 value collaboration network Boings.ai completed a seed round at a $30 million valuation.
DeFi
RWA Project TBook Announces Cumulative Financing Exceeding $10 Million
Embedded RWA liquidity layer TBook announced the completion of a new funding round led by SevenX Ventures, with a valuation exceeding $100 million. This round also attracted participation from Mask Network, prominent family offices, and existing investors, bringing TBook's total funding to over $10 million. Following this latest round, TBook's investors include SevenX Ventures, Sui Foundation, KuCoin Ventures, Mask Network, HT Capital, VistaLabs, Blofin, Bonfire Union, LYVC, GoPlus, and others.
The protocol plans to conduct a Token Generation Event (TGE) in Q1 2026. TBook is building an embedded RWA liquidity layer that intelligently connects asset issuers with qualified users through on-chain reputation infrastructure. TBook's infrastructure is built on a proprietary three-layer architecture: Identity Layer (Incentive Passport and vSBT), Intelligence Layer (WISE Credit Score), and Settlement Layer (TBook Vault).
River Secures Strategic Investment from Arthur Hayes' Maelstrom Fund
According to an official announcement by River, it has received a strategic investment from the Maelstrom Fund, established by BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes, to advance its chain-abstracted stablecoin system.
AI
NeuroMesh Completes $5 Million Strategic Round with Participation from Alpha Capital and Others
NeuroMesh, focused on embodied intelligence, announced the completion of a $5 million strategic funding round, valuing the company at $50 million post-money. This round saw participation from Alpha Capital and Coinvestor Ventures. The funds will be used to accelerate technology R&D, expand the team size, and further develop applications in industrial automation, service robotics, and other scenarios.
NeuroMesh is committed to providing on-device intelligent solutions for robots and smart devices. Through its on-device intelligence stack, robots can achieve real-time perception, planning, and execution without relying on the cloud. Simultaneously, the experience gained during learning is synchronized to a decentralized "collective brain," enabling continuous evolution and shared learning through network effects. This model allows the learning outcomes of intelligent agents to be verifiable and cumulative, driving the entire network to become smarter with use. NeuroMesh aims to build a truly native, verifiable, and shared autonomous intelligence world, making decentralized machine intelligence the infrastructure for the next generation of human-machine collaboration.
xAI Completes $20 Billion Series E Round with Strategic Participation from NVIDIA and Cisco
According to an official announcement by xAI, its Series E financing round exceeded the original $15 billion target, ultimately raising $20 billion. Participants included Valor Equity, Stepstone, Fidelity, Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, Baron, among others, with strategic investors including NVIDIA and Cisco. The funds will accelerate the construction of the world's largest GPU cluster and AI infrastructure. In 2025, xAI made breakthroughs in the Grok series models, voice assistants, image generation, and integration with the X platform, reaching 600 million monthly active users. The Grok 5 model is currently in training, and the company will continue to advance the development of AI products for consumers and enterprises.
(This financing is not included in the weekly report statistics)
AI Data Platform Protege Completes $30 Million Series A Extension Led by a16z
AI data platform Protege announced the completion of a $30 million Series A extension round led by a16z, bringing total funding to $65 million. Other investors included Footwork, CRV, Bloomberg Beta, Flex Capital, Shaper Capital, and others. Protege aggregates real-world data from various fields such as healthcare, media, and audio through licensing, cleans and optimizes the format, providing high-quality data support for AI training. Its partners include most of the "AI Seven Giants." The funds will be used to expand data domains, deepen institutional cooperation, and develop platform products.
(This financing is not included in the weekly report statistics)
Infrastructure & Tools
Decentralized Protocol Babylon Completes $15 Million Financing, Led by a16z Crypto
The decentralized protocol Babylon, co-founded by Stanford Professor David Tse, completed a $15 million financing round. This round was led by Andreessen Horowitz's a16z Crypto, and the project valuation was not disclosed. Babylon has developed a protocol called BTCVaults, aiming to allow Bitcoin holders to directly use their Bitcoin as collateral without intermediaries (such as exchanges or stablecoin issuers), while retaining control of the assets. The protocol plans to integrate with the lending protocol Aave in Q2 2026. Tse stated that the goal is to use cutting-edge technology to help users bypass intermediaries and enable Bitcoin assets to generate yield more directly. Babylon was founded in 2021, currently has a team of over 40 people, and has not yet generated revenue.
Blockchain Network ZenChain Completes $8.5 Million Financing, Led by DWF Labs and Others
Blockchain network ZenChain announced the completion of an $8.5 million financing round. This round was co-led by Watermelon Capital, DWF Labs, and Genesis Capital. Additionally, angel investors have committed an additional $1.5 million ahead of ZenChain's upcoming Token Generation Event (TGE).
The new funds will be used to accelerate core protocol development, expand validator and ecosystem participation, support market promotion and ecological initiatives, and prepare for the upcoming TGE and mainnet launch milestones. ZenChain aims to build a secure interoperability layer connecting Bitcoin-native capital with Ethereum-compatible (EVM) ecosystems, supporting cross-chain value transfer and decentralized applications. Its design focuses on capital efficiency, validator-aligned security, and long-term sustainability.
Barclays Bank Invests in Stablecoin Clearing Platform Ubyx
Barclays Bank made its first investment in a stablecoin-related company—US-based stablecoin clearing platform Ubyx—though the specific scale of this investment was not disclosed. Ryan Hayward, Head of Digital Assets and Strategic Investments at Barclays, stated: "As the token, blockchain, and wallet space continues to evolve, specialized technology will play a key role in providing connectivity and infrastructure, helping regulated financial institutions interact seamlessly. This investment aligns with Barclays' approach to exploring opportunities based on new forms of digital currency, such as stablecoins."
Centralized Finance
Stablecoin Payment Company Rain Completes New $250 Million Round, Post-Money Valuation Reaches $1.95 Billion
Stablecoin payment company Rain announced the completion of a new $250 million financing round, with a post-money valuation of $1.95 billion. This round was led by ICONIQ, with participation from institutions including Sapphire Ventures, Dragonfly, Bessemer, Lightspeed, and Galaxy Ventures. This round brings Rain's total funding to over $338 million.
Company co-founder and CEO Farooq Malik stated that the funds will be used to expand its business in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa, and help the company adapt to the rapidly changing global regulatory environment. Rain currently issues stablecoin payment cards in over 150 countries through a partnership with Visa, allowing cardholders to spend at local merchants or withdraw cash from ATMs. The company also plans to connect to payment systems like US ACH and European SEPA through partner financial institutions. Malik mentioned that the company may pursue strategic acquisitions in the future, having already acquired the rewards platform Uptop and the currency conversion platform Fern in the past year.
Crypto Brokerage HabitTrade Completes Nearly $10 Million Series A Round Led by Newborn Town
Crypto brokerage HabitTrade has completed a nearly $10 million Series A financing round led by Hong Kong-listed company Newborn Town, with participation from Bright Venture Capital, StableStock, and others. HabitTrade stated it will use this funding to accelerate the expansion of its global compliant brokerage infrastructure and promote the integration of traditional capital markets with on-chain finance.
Others
Web3 Value Collaboration Network Boings.ai Completes Seed Round at $30 Million Valuation
The Web3 value collaboration network for the AI era, Boings.ai, announced the completion of its seed funding round at a $30 million valuation. This round was led by Honey Capital, with participation from LandScape Capital, Hotcoin Labs, Starbase, and Go2Mars Labs. The new funds will be used for the platform's global expansion, user ecosystem growth, introduction of DAO partners, and acceleration of the development of its AI-driven matching engine. Boings.ai is a task launch platform that empowers "super individuals" to instantly transform skills into on-chain value. The platform is built on BNB Chain and powered by the 402 protocol.
Venture Capital Firms
a16z Completes $15 Billion Fundraise, Will Focus on Investing in AI and Crypto
a16z announced the completion of raising over $15 billion in capital. This capital includes: American Dynamism fund ($1.176 billion), Apps fund ($1.7 billion), Bio+Health fund ($700 million), Infrastructure fund ($1.7 billion), Growth fund ($6.75 billion), and other venture capital strategy funds ($3 billion). The announcement stated that its mission is to ensure the United States wins the technology competition for the next 100 years, focusing on winning key architectures like AI and crypto. Furthermore, it will also promote the application of related technologies in fields such as biology, health, defense, public safety, education, and entertainment.
AppWorks Completes Final Close of $165 Million Fund IV, Total Fundraising Reaches $386 Million
According to an announcement on the AppWorks website, it has completed the final close of its fourth flagship fund (Fund IV), raising $165 million, bringing the company's total fundraising to $386 million. This round attracted the first-time joint participation of three pan-Asian sovereign LPs: Taiwan's National Development Fund, Malaysia's national fund Jelawang Capital, and Korea's KVIC, as well as investments from corporations including Fubon Life Insurance, Taiwan Mobile, Wistron, Phison, and E Ink.
Since its establishment in 2009, AppWorks has built an ecosystem of over 2,000 founders and 653 active startups. In recent years, it has focused on AI and Web3, with over 70% of the latest accelerator projects coming from regions outside Taiwan. The fund will focus on early-stage project investments and has supported well-known companies like Lalamove, Animoca, and Flow. AppWorks stated that this fund will focus on high-potential entrepreneurial opportunities from emerging markets in Asia.
Acquisitions
Fireblocks Acquires Crypto Accounting Platform TRES Finance for $130 Million
Blockchain infrastructure company Fireblocks has reached an agreement to acquire crypto accounting platform TRES Finance for $130 million in cash and equity. This is Fireblocks' second acquisition within three months, following the acquisition of crypto wallet startup Dynamic for approximately $90 million last October. Fireblocks co-founder and CEO Michael Shaulov stated that acquiring TRES will help the company provide a more complete treasury management solution for enterprise clients.
TRES Finance was founded in 2022. Its platform helps corporate treasurers and accountants track the flow of crypto assets distributed across multiple platforms and wallets. Its clients include venture capital firm CoinFund, analytics platform Nansen, and the development team behind the crypto wallet Phantom. TRES raised $11 million in late 2023. Its co-founder and CEO Tal Zackon stated that this acquisition price is higher than the company's recent valuation.
(M&A events are not included in this weekly report data statistics)
